


can I stay here (I can sleep on the floor)

by saltfics



Category: Red White & Royal Blue - Casey McQuiston
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Henry Needs A Hug, How Do I Tag, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Light Angst, M/M, Not Famous AU, Swearing, Tumblr Prompt, hey yall lets make that a tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-14
Updated: 2020-05-14
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:21:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,654
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24174262
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saltfics/pseuds/saltfics
Summary: Henry Fox is a piece of shit. That’s all Alex knows about him, and all he cares to find out. So why is he at his front door in the middle of the night, wondering if he can stay until morning?Highschool AU. Not-famous AU.
Relationships: Alex Claremont-Diaz/Henry Fox-Mountchristen-Windsor
Comments: 42
Kudos: 288





	can I stay here (I can sleep on the floor)

**Author's Note:**

> I haven't titled a fic like that in years e_e But I got too attached to it.
> 
> Based on tumblr prompt: "Would it help if I stayed?"
> 
> Thanks so much for sending this! Not my best work, but I hope you like it anyway!

Doorbells in the middle of the night never prelude anything good. Alex is not asleep yet, but even the members of his family who were asleep peek their heads out of their rooms at the sound. He and June exchange a confused look as their mom wanders downstairs to answer it. Dread coils in his stomach, heightened by the ambience of the darkened hallway, illuminated only by a leftover nightlight downstairs and the little moonlight that manages to sneak in from outside. 

Where someone is still waiting on their porch.

Ellen takes a look through the peephole, frowns, and turns to Alex. ‘Come here,’ she mouths. ‘You should answer it.”

Curiosity overtakes this confusion. His mother doesn’t look scared, only a little concerned. She tells him she’s going to be upstairs if _they_ need anything and kisses him on his cheek as they pass each other by.

He waits for her to leave his sight and for the telltale sound of June’s lock, before he finally answers the door.

“ _Henry?”_

Henry Fox is a piece of shit. That is the only thing Alex knows about him and the only thing he cares to find out. When he first moved to their town and enrolled in _Alex’s_ fucking high school of all places, Alex offered, like an idiot, to walk him around the school. _Please stay away from me,_ the prick said, and they haven’t been friendly since.

So what exactly is Henry Fox doing outside of his door at 2 in the morning, looking… looking like…

“What the hell happened to you?”.

Henry looks wrecked.

His shirt is rumpled, the top two buttons undone, and his perfect blond hair is tousled (and not in that annoying, perfectly messy way it usually is). His cheeks are bright red, trailed with tear stains that glimmer under the warm, yellow glow of the porch-light, and he looks seconds away from refreshing them, the pools in his now red-rimmed blue eyes already close to their tipping point. His lower lip is trembling; Alex can’t look away from it.

“I—I’m sorry,” he stammers. He shakes his head, and a few tears come loose before he can blink them away. “I’m sorry, I know we’re not _friends…_ ” Understatement. “But uh, I was wondering—” His breathing starts to pick up and Alex can see his hands are shaking now. “I’m sorry, forget it. I’ll go—I shouldn’t have bothered you. Goodnight.”

The bastard actually goes to leave, as if he didn’t just upend Alex’s entire night. “Hold the fuck up,” he blurts out, grabbing Henry’s arm before he can go away. “Look, you already woke everyone up, so that’s out of the window— _wait,_ I’m not done _,_ ” Alex snaps when he tries to apologize, “and I can’t let you leave like this! You’ll cross the road distracted or something and I cannot have that on my conscience.” He tugs on his arm, turning Henry around to face him fully. “So tell me why you’re here.”

Henry takes a deep breath, all shaky and uncertain, like he’s not sure he should claim this much air for himself. 

Alex shifts his weight from one foot to another; the image of the pretentious prick he had plastered all over his mind for the guy is crumbling, but he’s not enjoying being the sole witness of this kind of petrified vulnerability.

“Can I—I was wondering—Well…”

“Spit it _out,_ Fox. It’s not like my opinion of you can get any lower.”

Henry huffs, scrunching his eyes shut as he runs a hand through his already messy hair. “This was a mistake.” Alex goes to protest—or maybe close the door on his face since he’s clearly not interested in sharing, after all, even though he woke up his entire family at 2 in the fucking morning—when Henry finds his missing guts. “Can I… stay here tonight? I don’t… Pez is away with his family for the weekend and… I don’t have anywhere else to go.”

Alex’s posture loses the defensive tension to it. The hand still holding the door slips down. He raises an eyebrow, the doubt overshadowing his most empathetic instincts, especially for a guy he doesn’t even get along with, but his mouth is set in a tight line. “…Why here?”

Henry flinches. He wipes at his eyes, leaving wet circles around them. He looks younger somehow, even though they’re both plenty young, just seventeen and stressed and stupid. But now, only a few months short of adulthood, picture-perfect, princely Henry Fox has never looked more like a child. And a lost one at that.

“I didn’t know where else they’d let me in… I thought your mom—because she’s...I’m sorry, this was stupid, I shouldn’t have asked this of you, we’re not friends. I’ll go.” His eyes look sad and big and so damn sky blue, the sight stirs something in Alex’s stomach. 

He groans in frustration. “Shut the fuck up, Henry. Where will you go?”

Henry pauses. His face is a shade paler than usual, which for him is rather impressive. He swallows slowly. “I… I don’t know.”

“Then get the fuck inside. I’m not going to leave you out in the cold, who do you take me for?”

“It’s 70 degrees, Alex.”

“You wanna stay on the porch?”

“Sorry.”

Alex flips the light switch on and leads Henry further inside the house, into the kitchen. Henry hovers in the doorway, uncomfortable. He looks smaller with his shoulders so slumped, curled in on himself, even if he has half a head on Alex (if Alex is being generous. To himself).

Alex rolls his eyes at him but urges him to take a seat. 

It’s still the middle of the night and he’s _exhausted,_ only half a straw away from saying ‘okay, you’re in the house, good night,’ and leaving Henry to wander the ground floor like a ghost while he sleeps. But this image of Henry being left out here alone wakes something unpleasant, and while Alex doesn’t _care_ if the guy is going to bolt the second he’s out of his sight with how nervous Henry looks, his mom will probably yell at him for letting him leave the house like this.

So he presents him with a box of teabags instead.

“Are you… assuming I like tea because I’m British?” Henry asks with a huff of a breath that might have been a laugh in better circumstances.

Alex throws the one he picked out in a mug, fills it with water and sticks it in the microwave. Henry looks absolutely horrified. Good.

“No, you ass. I’m assuming you like tea because half the school hangs out in the same coffeehouse and I _saw_ you.”

Despite his blasphemous ways, Henry accepts the mug with a grateful, albeit small, smile. His fingers curl around it, relishing the warmth, and he’s quiet for a moment, before he adds, “I didn’t realize you noticed.”

Wait, _what_ ? No. “Don’t flatter yourself, Fox. I was only checking where you were so I could stay far away. Like you wanted, _right_?” His voice comes out a little more spiteful than intended. As pissed as Alex will forever be at him, this might not be the best time for that.

But Henry lifts his head to look at him, blue eyes wide and confused. “What?”

“It’s honestly quite ironic that you’d come here, if you ask me…”

“Alex, I don’t understand. What do you mean?”

Alex scoffs, crossing his arms in front of his chest. But Henry remains hopelessly lost. “You really don’t remember?” he asks, leaning back against the kitchen counter. “Wow, okay.”

“Tell me. Please.”

“Are you going to tell me why you’re here if I do?” It’s a bit of an asshole move, but also Henry doesn’t remember being a dick to Alex two years ago. So maybe in two years’ time, he’ll forget this too.

Henry is quiet for a moment, gaze glued to his mug that’s still steaming. Alex catches a faint whiff of bergamot in the air from it. “ _Fine_ ,” he nods eventually, curt and almost snappy, about three layers of walls built around him in a second.

“When you first came to the school two years ago? I offered to show you around the school and you basically told me to fuck off?”

“I—”

“Oh, I’m sorry, I guess what you actually said was ‘ _please stay away from me’._ And yet, _here_ you are.” Henry shifts in his seat, his legs tensing like he’s contemplating making a run for it. “Don’t you _dare_ get up,” Alex adds for good measure.

“I… Not that it’s any excuse, but… do you know why we moved?”

Alex shifts in his seat, wracking his brains for what he knew about Henry. There’s an assortment of random facts he refuses to dwell on, but while he’s certain he must have heard about this before, Alex cannot remember.

Henry’s holding on to his mug so hard his fingers have gone white with the effort. With his head tilted down, his hair is covering his eyes, protecting him from Alex’s curious gaze. But there’s nothing to mute the sound of his voice as he speaks, though he tries, the sound too quiet, the words catching in his throat in a last-ditch attempt not to be heard. “My dad had died a couple of months before. You’re right, I was an arse to you, to- to everyone really. I didn’t want to talk to anyone, and especially I… didn’t think I could handle someone—someone, well… as vibrant as you. At that time. But you didn’t deserve my behavior, and I’m truly sorry.”

Alex feels the tips of his ears burning. He removes himself from the counter to take a seat next to Henry, who finally looks up to him. His lips are pressed into a wobbly line, and a fresh film of moisture is covering his eyes. 

“I’m sorry about your dad,” Alex whispers, afraid if he speaks too loud he’s going to say something stupid and ruin whatever kind of messed-up, sentimental moment they’re having.

He’s really not equipped to deal with this without sleep or coffee.

“No, you’re right. I shouldn’t have been mean to you. I’m sorry.”

Alex shrugs. “I know. So uh, you wanna sleep here?”

“If I say yes, will you make me explain why?”

“I’m not going to _make_ you. But I’d appreciate it.” He gets up, nodding at him to do the same. “Come on, I’ll fix up the couch for you.”

Henry follows like a shadow—not before he spends a torturous moment wondering what to do with his mug, until Alex takes pity on him and tells him to just leave it in the sink.

“The floor is also fine,” Henry mentions on their way up the stairs, nervousness radiating off of him in waves.

The first-floor hallway is quiet, but Alex doubts anyone is actually sleeping. June is too curious not to wait to see how this plays out and his mom is probably still waiting to see if she’s needed. Alex enters his room to pick up an extra set of sheets and, begrudgingly, his spare pillow, as Henry waits outside, disinclined to enter anywhere he wouldn’t be allowed in normal circumstances. It’s stuck firmly in the line between annoying and maybe a _little_ endearing. A little. Like a lost puppy. If that puppy has bitten your hand twice by now and you’re just about done with it.

“There’s a perfectly functional couch in the living room, why would you want to sleep on the floor?” Alex asks as he pushes past him and back downstairs, his hands full. Henry makes a move to take them from him but he waves him off.

“I just thought it might be better.”

“So between the relatively comfortable couch and the floor in my room, where, I’m not going to lie, I might step on you at some point and it may or may _not_ be on purpose, you’d pick my floor?”

Somehow Henry manages to slump even further. “I suppose not,” he says, clearing his throat.

They fix the makeshift bed together, removing the thick cushions to the side and spreading the pull-out couch before covering it with the sheet and placing the pillow at the top. “You’re all set,” Alex says with unearned triumph in his voice, and it takes him a few moments after Henry’s tense nod to realize he didn’t actually hand him a blanket. “You can speak to me, you know, I won’t bite,” he grumbles as he goes to fix his error.

“Doubtful.”

He’s halfway back down the stairs when he stops. 

“Look, you’re not _wrong_ , but…” He sighs through his nose, scratching the back of one leg with the other. “… I don’t know what happened to you tonight. But you’ve clearly had a bad day, so…” He takes the final few steps down and hands him the blanket along with a clean pair of pajamas that will be too small on him yet still more comfortable to sleep in than the clothes he’s been wearing all day. “I’ll just diss you twice as much tomorrow.”

“Sounds fair.”

“Okay!” he declares, a hint too loud for the night. He places his hands on his hips, admiring his handiwork. “You good?”

Henry hums, yet the sound comes higher than it should, strained. “Thank you, Alex. This—this means a lot.”

Alex nods once. “Just don’t fucking tell me to go away again, okay? Goodnight.”

He’s halfway up the stairs again when it _hits_ him: the shadowing, the discomfort, the way he wanted to _sleep on the floor_ . Alex curses himself on the inside, first for not getting it, but mostly for the fact that he’s so fucking weak for this odd, vulnerable, _human_ version of Henry ‘pristine’ Fox, and the change was so sudden and so clearly born of something vile that he can’t ignore it.

So Alex stops. He doesn’t turn around to meet Henry’s eyes. “Would it help if I stayed?”

He hears Henry’s sharp intake of breath. “What?”

 _Did you ask to sleep on the floor so you wouldn’t be alone in the room_? Alex bites at his lower lip to halt the words. “Hang on. Or—actually, just change and I’ll be here in five.”

“Alex, you don’t have to—”

“Hey, my house, my rules. We’re sharing, shut up.”

A ceaseless chorus of _fuck fuck fuck what am I doing fuck_ plays on repeat in his mind as he goes upstairs to grab a second set of bedding for the floor, until he decides to just jump all the way in and picks up only a spare pillow. Of course, he has to spend another four minutes pacing around the room so he won’t risk catching his uninvited house guest half-naked in his living room.

It would be more comfortable for Alex to just move Henry to sleep on his floor, but he went through all the trouble of making the couch, he might as well sleep on it. Wait.

When he descends the stairs, hopefully for the _last time_ tonight, Henry has already changed, his clothes folded and placed neatly on the closest chair, and he’s about to hide himself under covers when Alex tosses the second pillow to the couch, or rather, right onto the back of his head. He’ll live.

“Scooch over,” Alex grunts.

“Alex, you really don’t have to—”

“Just _move_ ,” he groans, and Henry shuffles away with some reluctance.

It takes Alex about two whole minutes to regret his decision, which is more than he thought it would.

The pull-up couch is meant to serve as a double bed, in theory, but they still feel too close. For Alex, who always sleeps alone, the slight dip in the bed where Henry lies is too noticeable; his presence impossible to ignore. Every move he makes himself is also amplified, every sound from shifting making him cringe as if he owes Henry not to be annoying in his sleep. But he hates the quiet too. With the lights turned off, and only scarce moonlight sneaking through half-drawn curtains to keep the darkness away, peace settles on them like a blanket, warm with the kind of fragile intimacy you can only get in those few quiet moments before sleep. In the private safety of the night, it almost feels like they’re friends, like they can lay things out in the nothingness around them and no one could ever take them away, not even each other.

Henry must feel it too. Either that, or he’s too tired to keep things all bottled up inside him and maybe this Alex, different from the one he knows, kinder, feels safe enough to hold them for him, if only for a little while.

“I had a fight with my brother…” he whispers, then holds his breath to see if Alex will react, or tell him to shut up so he can sleep. But Alex stays quiet, so he continues. “He didn’t, uh, explicitly kick me out but… I couldn’t stay there.”

“What about your mom?” Alex asks, matching his volume.

“Mum.. She hasn’t really _been_ here since—” He coughs around the lump in his throat. “Since Dad died. She might notice I’m gone in the morning. Or the day after that. It’s Philip who has been… trying to take care of us, and I try to understand that he’s strict because he doesn’t _know_ how to do this. He didn’t ask for this. But…” Henry’s voice wavers and cracks; his whole frame shivers, sending tremors through the bed. Alex has to fight the urge not to reach out and touch him (and he tells himself it’s to stop the couch from shaking). “Sometimes he’s so, so bad.”

He falls quiet for a while, and if it weren’t for the soft sounds of his crying, Alex would have thought him asleep.

He doesn’t know how to comfort him, doesn’t feel comfortable trying. Until a few hours ago, Alex hated the guy. But he never knew any of this. And while it can’t change Henry’s attitude towards _Alex_ , or the million other things that bother Alex about him, it feels as though someone tilted a crooked image into place, and while the lines and colors and shapes have not changed, the image suddenly makes a lot more sense, with its shadows and depths placed in the right direction at last.

Still, Alex longs for the missing piece, the one he’s not sure he should ask for. He reaches for it anyway. “Why were you fighting?”

Henry takes a deep breath that struggles to leave him, shivering between his lips. Alex hears the shift of his hair on the pillow and he’s struck with the knowledge that Henry is looking at him.

In the shadowed room, if Alex turns now all he’ll see is an outline of the boy next to him. Then again, he’s starting to fear that’s all he’s been seeing the entire time they’ve known each other.

“He got upset, because… well, I… I came out to him.”

“Came…” Alex tries to repeat, confused, before the words click in time with a sickening twist in his guts. “...You’re gay?”

“I’m very, very gay.”

Alex is still looking at the ceiling, but he feels Henry’s eyes continue to linger on him.

“No offense, but your brother is fucking bastard. Actually, scratch that, _yes offense._ To him.” Henry chuckles, the sound wet, yet soft and honest. “Wait, so you came here because—”

“Of your mum, yes. She always pushes for the pro-LGBT initiatives and I hoped… somewhat foolishly, I suppose, that even if you asked me why I came here… you wouldn’t turn me away.”

“Of course not,” Alex scrambles to reply, and he’s proud it comes out gentle and reassuring instead of the hasty protest it sounded like in his head. “Look, I’m sure my mom is fine with you staying here. Like, she _heard_ us, I’m sure she would have objected if it were any other way.” He smiles when Henry laughs again. “And we’ll talk to her in the morning. And maybe, I don’t know, she can talk to your mom?”

“Alex—”

“Or, or your brother? Or we’ll figure something else out for you. My mom is a force to be reckoned with, I tell you.” Henry whispers something unintelligible. “Sorry, what was that?”

“… So are you.”

“Oh.”

“Thank you, Alex. Truly. I don’t know what I would have done if…”

“Hey,” Alex interrupts and clears his throat because his voice is very _very_ hoarse out of the sudden. “So we’re not the best of friends. Whatever. That doesn’t mean I would just…” He sighs, the words not quite right in his head. “You coming here tonight was… brave. You’re brave, Fox. And if you ever repeat that to anyone ever, I’ll show you exactly the kind of force you’re reckoning with.”

Henry snorts. “Okay.”

“And if you snore, I’ll push your ass right out of this bed.”

“That’s fair.”

“Goodnight.”

“Night, Alex.”

Henry interrupts his sleep one more time that night, in a last act of defiant optimism against a day that tried so hard to hurt him. He shifts on the mattress and whispers his name, so quiet it takes a moment to take it for the call it is. And when Alex hums in question, Henry takes advantage of those vulnerable seconds before sleep, despite the risk that Alex won’t remember this in the morning. “Do you think we could be? Friends?”

Alex yawns a sleepy yes, and with at least one less burden on his chest, Henry lets himself sleep.

Maybe if Alex doesn’t remember the conversation, he’ll remember how sweet the words tasted on his lips, before they left him with the promise of something he couldn’t even imagine enough to hope.

**Author's Note:**

> ...........I tried?
> 
> Also, should I just make one Work for all the tumblr prompts? Because they're starting to become a lot, though they're all rather long so it still kiiind of works like this.
> 
> Anyway, as per usual, find me @ saltfics on tumblr and hey, please leave a comment before you go! Till next time~


End file.
